ABSTRACT
The tea sector has played an important role in the regional economy of Assam and northeast India. Not only does Assam produce around 52 per cent of the tea produced in India, the tea sector is the largest employer in the organised sector in the state. It employs around 590,000 workers directly and provides sustenance to another 660,000 as resident dependents in the tea estates. The performance of the tea sector in Assam needs close examination in a comparative perspective. The historical context of the development of the plantation economy of Assam is discussed briefly here, as one of our key arguments is that much of the contemporary problems in the tea plantations have their roots in the colonial roots of the sector. In this chapter the growth performance and structural features of the tea sector in Assam have been analysed at a disaggregated level and in a comparative perspective. The manifestations of the much-discussed crisis in the tea industry have been investigated to bring out the implications for changing production conditions in the tea gardens of Assam.
